Vineland Flashback Iraq Attack

[Carvill John]

[NB: I really meant to take time and make this coherent but when am I gonna 
get that sort of opportunity?:]

I've been on a Pynchon retro kick recently, reading Vineland yet again, just 
about to start a re-read of Mason & Dixon, dipping into bits of GR and 
sending  random copy and pasted chunks of it here there everywhere godawful 
mess of Slippery Elm and all trying to spread the word amongst my reluctant 
family and friends. Hard to get people into Pynch, I mean my wife loved the 
first sentence of GR, raved about it for days, but that was that. Funny 
peculiar I tend to think now of the earlier WWII London parts of GR as being 
relatively conventional/linear/'easy' compared to the spiralling juddering 
chaos of the 'Zone'.

Conicidentally watched the 1990 Dennis Hopper film 'Flashback' just the 
other day, and couldn't avoid the Vineland resonances, think this was 
briefly mentioned in one of the essays in 'The Vineland Papers' (by the way 
I see the Modern World Pynchon site is still looking for someone to review 
that collection, anyone wanna volunteer?), but I hadn't seen the film since 
I watched it at the time, and I hadn't read any Pynchon at all  - except a 
first abortive attempt at COL49 - back then. Looking at it now, the opening 
montage of images would make the perfect intro to a film of Vineland.

Anyway maybe it's all this Croatian brandy I'm drinking but it seems 
there're so many parallels, not least how the 1960s became the 1990s, the 
tragic generational plummet from idealistic campus radicals to yuppie hell 
whores, even little things like cops running for office, kids watching old 
16mm films of their left-wing radical parents, guys going to old favourite 
bars and finding them full of designer beers and jukeboxes they can't 
understand. No more 'Born To Be Wild'! And odd how it just must be 
coincidence that Pynchon's book and this film came out around the same time, 
presumambly unaware of each other but both in their way addressing how 2 
decades and 2 characters in the names turned hippie into yuppie.

First time I read Vineland, even the 1980s seemed to have faded from view, 
leaving only a lingering stench, Clinton was in the White House, and the 
political scandal wasn't Vietnam, Iran Contra or Watergate, it was blowjobs 
whose every residue some guy called Ken Starr seemed determined to sniff out 
and bring tail waggin' home to his master Mr Mellon Scaiffe.

Noticed the description of Brock Vond's octagonal glasses - reminded me of 
the cackling villain that is Rumsfeld, all the hmmm's and use of quaint old 
lady heavens-to-betsy phrases like 'why, underground of course', funny how 
these fascists insist on such polite antediluvian phrases like they're Bette 
Fucking Davis or something while dousing Iraq in flames.


Looked up the review of Flashback on AMG: "This formulaic film has some 
amusing moments, but feels too much like the high concept pilot for a TV 
situation comedy series. ... Flashback is a phony and artificial piece of 
work built on a precarious foundation of clichés regarding the generation 
gap between yuppie and hippie."

Yeah, well the film is kinda silly, and the ending is total bullshit, but 
for any p-lister who hasn't seen it I'd recommend it for at least curiosity 
value. I fist saw it with a bunch of old friends, I remember us being taken 
with the Dennis Hopper line, "The 90s are going to make the 60s look like 
the 50s" Hmmmm. Who knew the 2000s were going to make the 1980s look 
like.........what?

Well, lets hope Hurricane K has at least blown some good wind through the 
minds of the  somnambulant majority of US voters who somehow missed the 
Rushmore-solid fact that they're living in a Philip K Dick future shock 
reality and their great Leader couldn' give a rat's ass whether they live or 
die and on balance to be honest would prefer 'die' if they're not the rich 
bloated Philistine fucks he represents.

Goodnight and Dawg Bless.